The investment banking industry ain't what it used to be, reports BusinessWeek. Depite a record $1.93 trillion in global deals so far this year, the big boys of Wall Street are facing reduced margins and have to fight harder for every deal.

In fact, the magazine says, revenue has dropped 29 percent from the halcyon days of the tech boom in 2000. M&A is on track to seal $4 trillion worth of deals this year. One banker attributes the rush to merge to "a tremendous amount of liquidity that is driving the market."

Despite the boom, the banks only made $7.5 billion in the last six months but they made a record $10.6 billion in the first half of 2000. And more of their money is coming from trading operations not the traditional advisory services. One major cause is that start-ups had cash after every IPO and the banks took a big chunk but most of the deals these days are buyouts of billion dollar corporations and even if they have cash on hand, they're much more parsimonious about handing it out. And globalization too is making the market much more competitive.

One part of the IPO business is thriving, even if it's not a wise investment. BusinessWeek also reports that so-called "blank check" IPOs are up this year and they seem to have appeal to retail investors even though a Thomson Financial analyst says they are, on average, trading 7 percent below their initial price.